The weather outside is frightful.

No, no shoveling yet.  And, regardless of whether you’re calling it snowmageddon or snowpocolypse, it really is a lot of snow.  My only experience with this much snow at once was in Chicago in 1979 when I was barely old enough to remember.  The national weather service says they got 18 inches that January, though this description might be more accurate.  There is a picture of me sitting level with the top of a stop sign that weekend after plowing and I haven’t seen such dramatic snowfall since.

It’s still snowing (though less) and we’re just shy of 24 inches.  24.  Two feet.  That doesn’t seem like so much when you’re just thinking about it, but it means that cars are suggestions in a drift and if you stand in a dip, you’re up to your waist.  Charlottesville is a Southern city unaccustomed to snowfall.  On the plus side – everyone seems to be staying in (unlike DC where thousands of uninitiated snow drivers take to the highways at the first flake and stay out there til they crash and die).  On the minus side – there aren’t actually any plows.  More…tractors with plow attachments.

Tomorrow – shoveling.

I Missed My Garden

Today is the last day of our vegetable experiment.  All summer long we enjoyed the bounty of the season; heaps of lettuce in spring, peaches that ripened in the car on the way home and were almost bad by the time they hit your tongue, apples that looked like they fell off the tree and into the basket but tasted like they were polished with velvet gloves, late fall frozen blueberries and cider, and the sharp taste of farm onions and garlic.  The food collective we joined had a long season – from April to December – and today is the last day.

I don’t think we’ll hop on board next summer.  We couldn’t seem to find the right combination of feast and famine to effectively use all of our food (or have enough of it).  We missed the farmer’s market but felt like we couldn’t buy there while justifying the huge expenditure at the beginning of the summer.  The cost was heartbreaking for a few months.  Sure, we’d have spent it anyway, but we’d have spent it over time with a focus on the fruits and vegetables we loved.  We deeply enjoyed supporting local farmers, but would like to feel more connected to the food by buying directly from the farms that harvest the food and speaking to the people who grew it.  It’s a luxury we have, living where we do, and I’d like to take advantage of it.

We’re not walking away empty.  I learned an amazing amount from this summer and I’ll have the satisfied feeling that comes from lessons learned through cleaning dirt and eating vine-fresh fruits.

• Pumpkins will not grow when it is wet.  Tomatoes will not grow when it is cold.
• Cold, wet summers cannot be predicted and everyone feels the pain in their pocket and in their mouths.
• I prefer onions from Georgia with a hint of sweetness.
• Peels come off of peaches when they are less ripe, but pies are best made with the ripest peaches.  Go figure.
• Green onions will contaminate the entire car if you don’t wrap them up.
• Don’t expect apple season to last as long as it does in the grocery store.
• Forget citrus.  Eating locally involved no oranges.
• I don’t like to eat more than one squash per season.
• I used to think Bibb lettuce looked romantic.
• I never want to see a Bibb lettuce again.
• Fresh cider pulled straight from a vat brought straight from the orchard – yum.
• The end of corn season broke my heart.
• Red Sails Lettuce is the best sort of lettuce.
• I love wandering through markets and setting a menu based on produce.
• It rained all but two Wednesdays between April and December. Two.
• It’s not as fun to bring home wet green beans as you think.
• I like cauliflower when mashed with salt and butter.
• I love eating, and vegetables and the process of food but I missed my garden.

Shh.

I’m an introvert.  It took me a long time to admit that.  Well, that and it doesn’t really go with being manic (which, totally under control, thanks).  So after years of being “bubbly”, “perky” and “smiley” kill me now I’ve evolved into someone who laughs, is happy, smiles and who needs a minute, please.

This week has zapped every last ounce of energy I have.  Being that it’s only Tuesday, I’m afraid the rest of the week is going to be a little long and/or deadly.  My wife deserves my eternal gratitude (or at least tonight’s gratitude) for letting me come home, head to the basement and quietly sit under a blanket while the tv hummed.  You wish you were married to me, I know.

Those 30 minutes of quiet made a tremendous difference in my attitude.  My headache faded (more on acupuncture coming later), my mind relaxed, my shoulders loosened up and inside I folded in on myself.  That sounds a little like crumpling but it was more like being a morning glory, tucking away the blues and purples at night and folding wide open in the sun.  Today was about the tucking.  Maybe also tomorrow and the next day and the next and…

Delayed Gratification

A few months ago, I read that chocolate chip cookie dough was ten times better if left to sit in the refrigerator overnight before baking.  Chemically, I think the theory would hold true for any cookie with flour and butter.  Leaving the dough overnight allows the flour to break through the bonds of the butter just enough to turn out a cookie that is richer, has a sturdier texture and boasts a slight caramel flavor that swiftly bridges the chasm between homemade cookies and bakery wares.

A few weeks ago, I put together a batch of chocolate chip cookies.  I don’t really like chocolate chip cookies, but the chips had been sitting there, mocking me, and I was likely to try to eat them with a spoon and a handful of baby marshmallows at any second.  The marshmallows were rescued (you can breathe again) and cookies it was.  Here’s a secret.  I prefer raw cookie dough infinitely.  Baked, cookies have a flat, greasy flavor.  Recalling the overnight trick, I resisted eating more than a spoonful (yes, I’m aware of the egg terror) and shoved the bowl in the fridge.

After 12 hours, that dough tasted like some sort of keebler elf had snuck into my kitchen and substituted my regular cookie dough for sweet miracles.  It was a little darker and was more integrated than it had been the night before.  I couldn’t taste or feel the grains of sugar.  And in a blast of genius (and no small amount of loathing for hours spent scooping and baking trays of cookies), I rolled dozens of balls of dough and threw them into the freezer.  Not like that.  I wrapped them first.  We also baked a few and they were phenomenal.  Much better than any cookies I’d had recently.

A few hours ago, I came home and ate one small ball of raw, frozen dough.  After I finished lolling about in heaven, I baked six of the frozen cookies.  Between the overnight dough and the pre-made freezer balls, I am the happiest person alive.  Best. Idea. Ever.

No Parades of Any Kind

We had a fantastic snowfall last weekend.  It’s the first time I ever remember decorating the tree while heavy snow fell and Christmas carols played in the background.  I can’t believe it has never happened, but with a childhood spent in the west, it’s not entirely unlikely.  Still, it was a particularly storybook memory to tuck away.

While I’m not religious, I celebrate a holiday that brings family together (however you identify family) and focuses on giving.  We decorate a tree, we give thanks, we sing carols, I’m sure my wife has a word or two with god.  As for me, I welcome the coming longer days and the change of the seasons.  Spring is coming and along with it rebirth.  First though, rivers of eggnog, fantastic mistletoe kisses and heaps of chocolate.  Let’s not skip past those.

D says my family is fanatical about memory making.  Okay, I added the fanatical part.  And they are.  I grew up with my mother insisting that we were a “white picket fence” family and she constructed memories to go with it.  At the holidays, that meant gingerbread houses and men, sledding and hot chocolate, ice-skating on frozen ponds with colorful scarves and mittens.  She kept our childhood ornaments and carefully marked the dates, though the construction paper and popsicle stick ones have somehow disappeared, leaving only pretty ones behind.

Food features prominently in my family’s memories. Turkeys are golden and huge.  Ham is perfectly glossy.  There are dozens of tins of different cookies and plates of pies.  It’s a little like a Karo syrup Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  This year, I’m quietly appreciating a holiday season (and I’m counting Thanksgiving and birthdays in that) spent without my extended family and all the food and perfection that comes with it.  Not up to speed on my family’s weird birthdays?  Now you are.

This season, I’ll be able to get up as early (or as late) as I want to, wear sweats at the breakfast table, eat toast instead of cinnamon rolls, eat tacos instead of turkey, enjoy a non-gift focused celebration, listen to whatever music I want and not have to watch any parades OF ANY KIND.  There will still be memories (like when my wife doesn’t kill me for putting on the seventeenth unique version of Let it Snow.  You think I kid.) and the look on her face when she finds the tiny gifts I’ve tucked in her stocking.  It will be good.  I’m looking forward to my own sort of memory making.

Acupunture? Go!

One of the benefits of acupuncture has been the decrease of migraines and nightmares.  I know!  Exactly what it was supposed to do!  I’m not at the point where I’m giving my first-born over to the gods of chinese medicine, but I’m pretty impressed at the steady decrease of symptoms.

Who wouldn’t be thrilled not to wake up screaming anymore?  No more bugs in the sheets, no more skittering on the wall, no more opening doors where there are none, no more shaking and crying.  Can you believe I’m such a joy to sleep with?  My wife, she’s a saint.  My dreams have still been vivid and often unpleasant but the midnight jaunts are down to a bare minimum.  I woke up in the kitchen a week ago, but that’s the extent of it.

The migraines are dwindling.  It’s okay to fall over dead.  It’s practically a miracle.  Maybe it’s just a good month, but considering I’ve had headaches every day in December for the last. two. years. I think I’m doing pretty well so far.  Acupuncture being holistic and all that, it wasn’t surprising when the practitioner asked me if there was something else happening around the holidays that might be causing it and truthfully, I just don’t know.  Maybe this season will be illuminating.

The sessions themselves have all been different.  Though she’s mostly sticking places on my feet and belly (and sometimes head) the sensations vary from floating – one of the best – to making my hands drip with sweat – one of the weirdest.  Sometimes it hurts for a second.  The day she pricked my third eye I felt like my face was on fire.  For a week.  Sometimes it’s like a deep ringing in my center.  Often I can’t feel the needles at all.  The feet?  Not so comfortable.  All you folks with ankle tattoos?  Impressive.

I’m going to stick with it for another month since it seems to be helping.  We could all use the sleep around here and I’m enjoying being able to see on a regular basis.  Who’d have thought?

But soft, what light through yonder window breaks…

Readers, I have failed you.  Things are afoot here and I’ve abandoned you to the wilderness of November without even a guiding signpost.  I know, you might never recover from this heartbreak. Years, later, you will still turn aside at your lover’s sentimental kisses and stifle a sob, all because we were ripped from each other’s embrace.

No?  Well, we all have our fantasies.

Fear not, December brings more posting.  I know you can hardly wait.

In Which I Side With Rats

You all know by now that I’m awake at night more often than I’d like to be.  Last night, I lay there as long as I could, wondering why I couldn’t fall asleep.  Usually, it’s an exercise in solving every possible problem that could come up in the next 20 years.  Surprise!  It can take awhile.  This time I was caught up in things I’d like to be doing.  It’s as if I would never have another free moment ever and these precious eight hours were all I would have to get a million things done.

I wish I could say these were important tasks, but they aren’t.  Sure, that wedding present is late.  But my sister’s birthday gift doesn’t need to be shipped til next week.  And really, that recorded show from October can probably wait another week.  It just feels like there are never enough hours in the day.  Or maybe I’m squandering the time I do have.  Regardless, I’d rather not lay there in bed thinking about it.

And then there’s this.  Yay!  Lab rats agree with me, lack of sleep isn’t a good idea.  I’ve exhausted my fall asleep methods, now to figure out how to pack more into a day.

Drip Baby

We realized sometime over the summer that we were getting HBO for free.  Well, not free exactly, since we had already given our first-born to the cable company in order to be able to have full access to AMC’s Hoarders.  What?  We have our reasons.

So, we’ve been enjoying our free year of HBO.  If, by enjoying, you mean sometimes remembering to see if any good movies are on, deciding there aren’t, hoping for a rerun of True Blood instead, and otherwise forgetting we even have cable.  But, we have it and with it we have access to semi-risque programming that involves scantily clad women.  As you can imagine, we’re all about scantily clad women.

This has led us to the early 90s wackiness that is Real Sex.  Have you seen this show?  Between segments on all manner of kinky indulgence (like phone sex, masturbation and mutual massage – the horror!) folks on the street are asked to give their opinion on topics relevant to the clips.  These are usually early thirties folks out for a night on the town, often tipsy, usually giggly, holding forth on everything from spanking to talking dirty.  Not a huge range. Especially not considering the favorite topic of Real Sex – getting messy.

Perhaps the producers were really into food and sex.  Or maybe they love the idea of women with whipped cream on their noses.  One way or another, episode after episode of Real Sex features beautiful women  in some state of food or paint related mess, often in a ring, or pool with chubby, messy men looking on.  Wikipedia describes this fetish nicely, though I wonder if there isn’t a more technical term for it.  Whatever it is, someone out there is fascinated by it.

That someone is shilling faucets.

Acupuncture

I started seeing an acupuncturist.  I mean really started – just one visit so far.  Apparently, she let loose seven dragons and, considering I didn’t even know I had any dragons, it was very pleasant.

She was a likable lady.  I’ve had mixed results with therapists and doctors of all sorts in the past and it’s always a delight to find someone who is likable from the first instant.  I had hoped she would be as sincere, upbeat and professional as her voice sounded on the telephone and I was delighted to find she was.  Given my typical reaction to white coats (not that she was wearing one) things went very well.

I’m trying acupuncture for a billion reasons, not least of which are the nasty migraines and incessant nightmares.  D and I would both like to get a good nights sleep.   The first session was a long two hours – the first spent exhausting my physical, mental and emotional history and the second pushing needles.  The history was unremarkable, except for the disturbing self-realization that I’m gathering soul scars as I get older.  I deeply enjoyed the second half.

Shedding my pants and socks, I had a lovely high table to lay on with sheets and blankets.  She used seven needles (to release the seven dragons that fight the body’s demons – an initial treatment done once) and put three in my stomach, one in each thigh and one on each foot (or was it ankle?)  She then came back at regular intervals to twist the needles a quarter turn until she’d gone all the way around.  Sounds a little brutal but wasn’t remarkable at all.

The sensations during treatment were remarkable.  As she put each needle in, it felt as though someone was gently pressing down on my back from the inside.  It was a heavy, pleasant feeling.  I’m not afraid of needles, and these are so small, they barely created a sensation other than the weight in my center.  Occasionally, the needles felt cold or radiated tingles, but for the most part, I was unaware that they were there.

During the times she was out of the room, I concentrating on breathing as she suggested.  At first my mind was busy, flying all over the place.  When she came back into the room and I mentioned the commotion, she said I might try being a river bed with the thoughts flowing above.  That worked beautifully and I felt as though I was glued to the table when she came back into the room again.  I couldn’t have moved if she had asked.  I was cemented to the table.  After that I slowly spun upward again until I was ready to be on my way by the time she finished.  I don’t think I’ve been so completely relaxed in a long time.

I’ll be heading back again every week for six weeks to see if the acupuncture has any effect.  Folks have been suggesting I try for years and I’ve always been willing but never motivated to spend the extra time and money.  At this point, no new solutions are coming from the traditional medical community and I’ve always been at home with alternative techniques, so it’s well worth the try.  Here’s to hoping the dragons swallow the nightmares.